The difference between the new Manhattan NBA Store less than three weeks before Christmas and how it will look when it opens is a margin wider than an NBA team on its first day of camp and in its playoff opener. In both cases, it’s more about what’s to be than what is.
So, last week, for a SportsBusiness Journal preview of the league’s new retail emporium at 45th Street and Fifth Avenue, we barely squeezed between some orange Jersey Barriers, a scissor lift and a handful of construction workers to gain access. Inside, the 25,000-square-foot, three-story expression of the NBA brand is still more construction site than flagship store.
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A rendering shows how the NBA’s new store will look at 45th Street and Fifth Avenue. In the heart of the holiday buying season, work continues inside.
Rendering: GENSLER |
To be sure, there were some fixtures, even some products on display. Still, discarded boxes and tools were everywhere as workmen scurried in the rush to open in time for holiday shopping.
Will that happen? Given the vagaries of construction and trade unions in New York City, at this point opening the store that the league says will purvey “the most comprehensive in-store selection of NBA-licensed products anywhere” seems more important than when it opens. Construction began early this year.
“We’re still shooting for a before-Christmas opening,” said Chris Brennan, the NBA’s senior vice president of global retail development, “but even that will be a soft launch. Fifth Avenue retail is about the ‘wow.’ That is what’s important.”
About the NBA Store
■ TOTAL LICENSEES: Nearly 60
■ LEAST EXPENSIVE PRODUCTS: Six licensed pencils for $2
■ MOST EXPENSIVE: Signed lithograph of the 50 greatest NBA players for $75,000
■ TOTAL UNITS IN STORE: 75,000
■ RETAIL SPACE: 15,000 square feet
■ HATS IN HEADWEAR DISPLAY: 2,500
■ EMPLOYEES: 75-100
Even without a lot of the finish work complete, you can begin to see the “wow” taking shape. A dramatic two-story curved glass facade juts onto the southeast corner of 45th and Fifth Avenue, which last held a Michael C. Fina store.
Inside the corner glass, workers are assembling a representation of a basketball net that will be 32 feet high and eventually be lit up from within its component tubes through 2,000 feet of wiring connecting 31,320 LEDs inside.
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Photos by: TERRY LEFTON / STAFF
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A 10-by-4 1/2-foot NBA Logoman trademark will hang above the front door on Fifth Avenue, along with a smaller one on 45th Street. If that doesn’t attract customers, the 400-square-foot video wall that will wrap behind the registers should bring them in, especially when games are playing. Other tech features include tablets that can find merchandise and check out customers when registers are busy, and interactive product displays, in which shoppers can find favorite players and their merchandise on large, wall-mounted touch screens.
“It’s a combination of technology that informs the customers and letting the NBA brand inform the design,” said Mark Brungo, senior associate at Gensler, which designed the store, along with Fifth Avenue flagship stores for Microsoft, Harman and Uniqlo.
The second level of the new NBA Store will have a 3,000-square-foot event space, which already has been booked for private events. It also will be the home of kids apparel (the “rookie section”), video-game kiosks, two Pop-a-Shots, and women’s and WNBA merchandise. NBA sponsor State Farm ties in with a branded “Store Assist” concierge desk.
The lower level includes a customized jersey center from Silver Crystal, a retro “Hardwood Classics” and a 40-foot-long shoe wall that will sell hundreds of different models from Nike/Jordan, Under Armour and Adidas. Spalding shows off its brand with a ball “chandelier,” fashioned from 68 of its NBA game balls.
The NBA’s history with branded retail began in 1998 with a 35,000-square-foot store at 666 Fifth Ave., which included a basketball court and a life-size Shaq bobblehead. In 2011, after rejecting a hefty rent increase, the NBA opened a 6,000-square-foot store five blocks south on Fifth Avenue, which it referred to as a “temporary” location for the next four years, until it closed in August. Ironically, those first two stores each opened during lockouts.
Fanatics is operating the new location.
“It’s a fine line, but we want to make it a great brand experience and a great retail experience,” said Brendan McQuillan, Fanatics vice president of in-venue commerce. “We tried to marry those two things.”
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Renderings show how the interior will look, including part of the LED display behind the corner glass facade (below).
Renderings: GENSLER |
